


A Flower Cursed by Love

by Dusk_Till_Dawn



Series: Hanahaki [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Felix has precisely three brain cells and no emotional intelligence, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Hanahaki Disease, Ingrid just wants these two idiots to be happy, M/M, Mercedes is a Queen, Minor Annette Fantine Dominic/Mercedes von Martritz, Minor Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth, Sylvain has one brain cell, Very very slight canon divergence (To make interactions more dynamic)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:27:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21982891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dusk_Till_Dawn/pseuds/Dusk_Till_Dawn
Summary: “You aren’t allowed to die before me.” It was a preposterous demand. Sylvain was expiring faster than a flower plucked from its roots.“I promise.”
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Series: Hanahaki [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582444
Kudos: 30





	A Flower Cursed by Love

**Author's Note:**

> So it's literally been like four months but I had to write about these two. After playing through Fire Emblem like, fifty times I decided I'd finally start. (By the way don't expect this series to make any sort of sense. Occasionally I just stumble across a pairing that I just feel the urge to write for. It doesn't have to be popular, or canon, or particularly obscure. I just write because I enjoy it.) And also to clarify, the Hanahaki in this story in incurable. It stems from intense romantic attraction, and continues to afflict the victim for as long as they believe their attraction is one-sided.

He was dying. That much was obvious. Equally obvious was what was doing the killing. Hanahaki wasn't particularly common, but it wasn't particularly _un_ common either. It required notoriously intense, one-sided romantic feelings after all. And it happened most frequently in scenarios of star-crossed lovers. Unsurprising considering the surrounding societal dynamic. Not that the nobility, a majority of them with their heads stuck up the ass of their own crest, would ever give a damn about a dying peasant. And if it ever went the other way there were healers specialized in dealing with it. It was never a full cure, never enough to ensure a long happy life. A full cure didn't exist anyway. It simply bought the victim more time. Rarely was that time ever a gift. More often than not the time would be used for torture. Beating, conditioning, hypnosis, anything to falsify feelings. Forcing an heir to have a child before their untimely demise. Both ‘solutions’ were equally terrible for the victim, and equally accepted in a society of crest bearers. It made Sylvain sick to his stomach. So when the first signs of it cropped up on that fateful day during the Guardian Moon, he essentially kidnapped Mercedes.

Kidnapping, he mused, was perhaps a strong word but it felt rather accurate considering she had rarely left his side since then. He had walked calmly to her door, knocked calmly, smiled calmly, and been let in calmly. Then he had fallen apart. She spared some time fussing over him as he tripped over his words in a panic. But at the utterance of a single word she had paused, stopped, looked at him. And from then on she made it her business to check in on him every day. She tried her best not to hover, she knew his tendencies with girls after all, and was surprisingly non-judgemental about it. But she was a constant presence and a gifted healer. When Garrag Mach fell, he returned to Gautier territory and she came with him. Of course, in order to smuggle her in so to speak, he had to let his father assume some things. But at least he had the excuse of war to explain Mercedes' nonexistent baby bump.

The Millenium Festival, he would not miss it for the world, he doubted Mercedes would either. But five years was a long time, and even with Mercedes' near-constant presence, the disease marched on dutifully, slowly. Half of its course already run. He was coughing up petals now. Occasionally a fully bloomed flower would find its painful, bloody way up his esophagus, and then he'd have to smile exceptionally fake to make it through the rest of the interaction. It was probably sad that he had already perfected fake smiles far before this. But it suited this purpose as well as it had any other. Well, except for when it came to Ingrid and Felix. The toll of the disease was much more apparent now than it had been five years prior. Ingrid had grilled him about it, which was understandable. Mercedes had let him keep his peace, his quiet, his secrecy. She was a true friend. And where she was a caretaker, Ingrid was a sibling. And a worried sibling at that. She had already lost one she loved to tragedy, and almost come down with the disease herself in her grief. Sylvain understood her nosiness, he understood because he would have done the same thing in her position. But he was a special case.

It had been five years since he had gotten Hanahaki and he didn't know who he was pining for. Initially, he thought Ingrid was going to slap him or call him a liar or something. Instead she just looked quietly perplexed, almost pitying. 

"Can you not tell?" He didn't know. Which, in all truthfulness probably meant he couldn't. He shrugged instead, noncommittal. Talking didn't quite hurt yet but it was irritating. He'd avoid it if he could. Winter was in full swing, maybe he should start wearing a scarf. There was supposed to be a special meal in the dining hall, he'd try and convince the professor to join him. Ingrid was looking at him disapprovingly, her pretty face pulled into a frown. Sylvain watched too deep stress lines form on a too young face. The war had taken a toll on them all. "You can't avoid the problem by disappearing off into your head." Sylvian disagreed but he wasn't about to say that aloud. Ingrid could probably crush his spine with her fingertips. "I'll try my best to help you figure out who it is you like." He appreciated the sentiment but he doubted she'd be able to list someone he hadn't yet thought about. He'd had five years. Mercedes predicted he had another five more. Hopefully enough to see this war through.

Felix was a different beast. He spun on Sylvain one day, snarling like a wounded wolf. Sylvain noted idly that the raven-haired boy was gripping his sword far too tight.

"How long did you think you could keep it from us?" A real sword, dull, but no less real, and no less deadly in Felix's hands, pointed threateningly at his adam's apple. Sylvain eyed it cautiously before responding, his voice rough from coughing.

"It was not my intent to keep it from anyone except my father." Felix scowled. He wasn't pretty like Ingrid. Sylvain's thoughts chased after the idea like clouds across a blue sky. No, he wasn't pretty. Already he had permanent lines etched into fair skin by a constant frown. He had the Fraldarius genes, shields of the North. He was severe, and cold, and deadly. Furrowing his eyebrows slightly he tried to zero in on it. The adjective he was looking for flitted on the edge of his cloud chasing thoughts.

"Well you did a shitty job of that then. All we heard from Gautier territory was his boasting. 'My son went and found a crest bearing wife'. Even in the middle of a war." Felix looked disgusted. "That's all his letters would contain." Sylvain locked his gaze with his shorter companion. Voice grave and damaged.

"I don't know who it is Feli." The Fraldarius heir started at his sudden intensity and blinked owlishly up at him. "I don't know who I'm in love with."

Months passed, missions changed, and death loomed like an old and satan worshipping friend. _So basically Hubert_ , his mind supplied helpfully, and Sylvain resisted the urge to slap himself. The inevitable clash at Gronder had dampened everyone's spirits. Sylvain couldn't seem to struggle out of the past. Reading Bernadetta's gifted writing, playing chess with Claude and Hubert. Being painfully, gleefully, heart-racingly honest with Dorothea. _He was dying_. War was long and cruel. He and Mercedes had spent five long years averting their eyes from the faceless swaths of people lying dead on the field of battle. And Cornelia marched ever onward, forward. Determined to break the backbone of Faerghus. So they had both agreed, which is to say Sylvain pleaded. They had both agreed to lessen Sylvain's treatment. Mercedes needed to reserve her magic. Needed it for when their friends fell, bleeding around them. Needed it to reach bloodstained warriors on the frontlines of battle. Needed it to reach out and restore life to her comrades when they were on the brink of death. To watch them get up only to be cut down again.

A month was not enough. A month would never be enough. And he could only watch in growing horror, the Empress. Lavender eyes flashing with resolve, fire burning in her veins as she signalled her troops to push forward. In front of him, Dimitri cried out for blood, for death _in more ways than one_. Gritting his teeth Sylvain charged forward with the horde. And on the other end of the field. Claude stood next to Hilda. Almaryan brown and soft pink looked out together. There was a deep sort of sadness there. The same that echoed and rattled around inside Sylvain's flower-corrupted chest. And then Claude stepped forward. His eyes narrowed to a single, deadly point. Brutal and unfeeling, like the tips of his arrows. He lifted an arm, slowly, deliberately. When the tide of yellow unleashed itself onto the battlefield, Sylvian was convinced the Alliance Leader had not uttered a single word.

The loss of Mercedes' treatments took its toll. Sylvain coughed up as much blood as the enemies he slew now. Driving two swift strikes of a silver lance into the heart of a brawler, an archer, a healer _just like Mercedes._ Feeling the ribcage give, and the impact shake its way down the shaft of the bloody weapon. If his chest were to ever be cleaved in half, the enemy would be gifted flowers. He was a dead man walking. But he couldn't die. He had to see his friends through, had to protect them till the end of the war. Then, maybe he could peacefully pass.

That's what his thoughts snagged on when he saw Felix. Felix, who had been right by his side just moments before. Dash forward to slice into the unprotected side of a mage. It only took two hits. Felix was fast, too fast for the enemy unit to react. And at first, Sylvain didn't notice. He didn't notice. And then he heard his old Professor scream. It was at their command that he turned, it was at their command that he spurred his horse frantically into full speed _and then some_. But it was his own will that kept him going. Past the forest's underbrush that should have hindered his steed. Past the battered bodies of allies who were fighting for their lives. Past Felix himself. Until he'd planted himself right in front of the Brigand. Faintly, he heard Felix yell.

Well, it sure hurt a shit-ton but Mercedes was undoubtedly a miracle worker. His wounds were very quickly reduced to minor injuries, and he retired to his room early after the battle to sleep it off. At least, that was the plan until there was a loud banging at his door. _It was Felix_ he realized as he groggily sat up. Seconds away from falling asleep.

"Sylvain Jose Gautier! Open the door this instant!" _No_ , he thought stubbornly to himself. _I don't think I will_ . It was more than likely that if he did, Felix would charge in here and finish what the Brigand had started. The banging stopped for a bit, but Felix's shadow didn't move. Sylvain eyed it suspiciously through the crack at the bottom of the bedroom door, until an even more suspicious noise diverted his attention. The lock fell into place with a clink, and a very irritated Felix stepped through the doorway. _And here I thought the honor of slaying me would go to the Hanahaki disease. Not you._ Sylvain thought. Tired, and just a little pissy from his wounds he gently laid back down on the bed.

"It very nearly went to that enemy Brigand." Felix hissed out shakily. Ah, so he'd accidentally said it aloud. The fatigue must be worse than he thought. He didn't respond to the obvious jab, staring blankly at the wall furthest from where Felix stood. He didn't really need them lecturing him now. He already knew his shortcomings and his failures. He'd had five years and then some to think about it. Imminent death tended to spur on one's introspection. Movement sounded behind him. He tried not to focus on it, tried to block out Felix's presence. The bed dipped beside him and he felt a warm weight settle against his back. And then…Stunned he tried to turn, craning his neck to get a better view of his companion.

"Feli," He managed to rasp out "are you crying?" A weak fist slammed into his back, just below his right shoulder blade.

"Shut up." Another halfhearted punch. "You're an idiot. I wish you'd die. You're an idiot who went and got Hanahaki for someone you don't even know you're in love with. And you're stupid, and dense, and _you're dying_." Felix missed him this time, hitting the pillow by their heads. By the sound of it, that punch would have hurt a lot more had Felix decided to connect it. "And then-" the raven-haired boy had to cut himself off, choking back a sob and the ugly voice crack that accompanied it. "Then you went and almost got yourself killed anyway." Sylvain managed to turn himself fully around, facing Felix. The shorter boy clung sulkily to the front of his shirt. Hair down, face buried into his chest where Sylvain felt the tears starting to seep through the thin material.

"Feli…" He pulled the boy closer against him. "Feli I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you like that. I know it's not what you would have wanted." Sylvain paused, forcing himself to choke down a coughing fit, swearing he could feel the roots of the flowers wind ever tighter. "I just couldn't help it. I saw you in danger and I couldn't stop myself. It's instinct to me Feli. Protecting you, protecting Ingrid. You guys are my family." Felix slowly raised his head up to look at the ginger. He really wasn't pretty. Sylvain chuckled softly to himself. His pale skin was blotchy, and his eyes slightly red from crying. His shoulder-length hair was a mess. The hair ties probably lost on the floor someplace. _Beautiful_. The nagging feeling came back, like he was missing something. It was cut off by Felix not-so-gracefully slamming the top part of his head up into Sylvain’s chin. Sylvain felt his head snap back at an awkward angle and he blinked dazedly, groaning in pain. He felt more than heard Felix's answering rumble of agony from where the mop of raven hair was burrowed into his chest. 

"Your chin is haaaard." Felix whined pitifully into Sylvain’s shirt. The redhead spluttered indignantly. 

"You're the one who just slammed your head into it!” Felix still refused to make eye contact, but Sylvain felt him laughing. The little fucker.

“I figured it was adequate payback for the worry you put me through.” Unfortunately, there was no arguing with that. As much as Sylvain wanted to

“I’ll try not to do it again.” Felix yawned quietly.

“You aren’t allowed to die before me.” It was a preposterous demand. Sylvain was expiring faster than a flower plucked from its roots. 

“I promise.” Felix hummed softly in contentment, and in a few seconds his breath had evened out and he was snoring lightly. It reminded Sylvain of the sleepovers they used to have as a kid. There were a precious few memories of he, Ingrid, and Felix, huddled around an elderly caretaker and her wise stories as they all started to drift off to sleep. _Beautiful_ , the thought came more clearly to him this time as he stared off into the darkness of his room. _Felix was beautiful_. Feeling his mind slip towards unconsciousness he twisted the line around in his head a couple of times, searching for its imperfections. Words like that were constantly used in folly. They were fake and honeyed, used for cheap flirtations and quick escapes. The last time he had heard it sincerely was from Mercedes.

“She was beautiful.” The healer’s voice sounded far away. Laced with awe and sadness. Sylvain sat next to her on the highest turret of the Gautier house. “I never really got to tell her sincerely. She always took it platonically after all.” The setting sun dyed the cold grey stones a pleasant orange as Mercedes continued. “It’s strange don’t you think? How it’s always hardest to see those close to us.”

“I’m not very good at this.” The professor's voice floated up from below. Sylvain stopped and peered down. “He’s hiding something, y’know. Some terrible burden.” Byleth’s mouth curved into a small frown. “I want to help him. I want to walk beside him and lift some of the weight off his shoulders.” The former mercenary kneeled down in front of the simple headstone, placing a small bouquet of flowers on the grave. “Is that love dad? I don’t even know anymore.”

“I’m engaged!” Ingrid proudly displayed her ring to a fourteen year old Sylvain. He looked at her questioningly. If she was happy then he was too, but she understood the implications of an arranged marriage right? Twelve year old Ingrid looked at him knowingly, “I know we were betrothed at birth. I know that neither of us ever had a choice.” She looked down at her ring finger, smiling softly at the delicate metal band. “But I sincerely believe that I love him.” She turned her gaze back towards his with a sudden burning intensity. “Be happy Sylvain. Marry someone that makes you happy. We only have so long on this earth, and love comes from the most unlikely of places.”


End file.
